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Monthly Archives: December 2014

If my husband didn’t have me as his voice of reason, our home would be overrun by kitschy items like these awesome Muffin Tops moulds. I nearly succumbed to its temptations, but I reminded myself that in five years time, will I still find them funny? Most likely not. So they didn’t leave the store with us. But these adorable farm animals lid lifters did, and I do not regret that choice one bit. They are simply adorable.

Rollercoasters and I don’t get along. As much as I want to wholeheartedly enjoy rollercoasters, I always end up regretting getting on them. Every. single. time.

Yesterday was not any different. We ventured to Movie World to experience their White Christmas event. I love theme parks, fairs and anything that offers entertainment of this kind. Big kid right here. Plus, I love watching the faces of the real kids when they meet their favorite Princess or ride their favorite rides. I take pleasure in seeing other people’s happiness through their eyes.

I knew before going into Movie World that such rides as Superman Escape, Green Latern, Batwing Supershot, etc. were going to be out of the question. After riding Space Mountain and Splash Mountain at Disney World, I knew better not to delve into the idea of riding a hardcore rollercoaster like those types ever again. Just the thought of it made me feel ill. I still regret that morning that I got on Space Mountain. I am not exaggerating when I say that I honestly thought I was going to pass out midway through that ride. I should stop talking about it, does me no good reliving those three nightmarish minutes.

So anyway, walked into Movie World. We, as a group, decided that Scooby-Doo Spooky Coaster sounded harmless enough. Come on, it’s Scooby-Doo and it was in the vicinity of the Kids section of MW. How bad could it be? I entered that scary-looking castle all excited about this tame ride (at least that’s what I thought it was going to be). Perhaps the word Spooky should have been an indication. Better yet, the word Coaster really should have been the red-flag from the very beginning. Lesson learned.

I got on the ride with Zach right beside me (which was already one up against Space Mountain, where you had to sit by yourself in this tiny pod). I was feeling good. I wasn’t even entertaining the idea that this ride would be terrifying. The first minute went fine. Ghoulish animatronics, dark corridors, sharp turns. I handled that just fine. Then we went up and paused for a good 15 seconds of nothingness. That’s when my heart started racing. When they’re building the anticipation, I knew it was going to be downhill from there. And I was right. Not only did we go downhill, but we went downhill BACKWARDS. Worse nightmare – going backwards down a steep rollercoaster. In the freakin’ dark. To help, I closed my eyes and went to my happy place. In this case, my happy place was anything that prevented me from vomiting and/or blacking out. I could feel the blood drain from my head. If this ride took a photograph of its riders in the middle of descent, I would look like a white ghost clenching on the bars with my eyes closed. How appropriate.

Four minutes, that’s how long the ride went for (one entire minute longer than SM). I screamed a few times – not because it was Spooky that’s for sure (because remember, I had my eyes closed for 90% of the ride). I was so delighted to have survived it with just four minutes of anxiety and jelly legs for 30 seconds after the ride. All in all, I got off just fine. I managed to enjoy the rest of the evening by decorating a Gingerbread Man, going on the Justice League 3D Ride (which went 5km/h, no backward motion, just good wholesome fun) and watching a Looney Tunes Parade. All’s well that ends well.

Colin Firth knows how to get into the Christmas Spirit with that sexy sweater of his

Yesterday, during one of Brisbane’s weekly afternoon storms, I started humming “The weather outside is frightful…”. It just seemed appropriate considering the weather outside really was beginning to be frightful! I honestly thought we were in for yet another horrible Thursday evening – flooding, downed trees, transportation chaos, etc, etc. But luckily, the most we got was a case of torrential rain coming from all sides. So mild compared to other weeks that I saw quite a few #anticlimax hashtags accompanying the popular #bnestorm ones.

Anyway, I digress. The photo above was taken this morning, courtesy of JP. Yesterday, before I left the office to face the storm, I had noticed that she was cutting out shapes but I wasn’t certain what it was of. Well, when I walked in the office this morning, I saw that she had spread Christmas cheer and had decorated our area – tinsel was everywhere, festive photos were littered around cubicles and JS’ office door had a Will Ferrell (as Elf) photo & quote on it. I was impressed!

So when she arrived, I applauded her work and she then asked me my favorite movie and/or actor. Without hesitation I told her that it had to be none other than Mr. Darcy himself, Colin Firth. I rambled on about how much I loved him as Fitzwilliam Darcy in the BBC’s production of Pride & Prejudice. Then it clicked! She was going to find me a Darcy photo for my Christmas decor! And thus the reason why I know have this aptly-themed Christmas photo of Colin Firth wearing one heck of a reindeer sweater stuck on my whiteboard in my office. I had a good giggle over it and whenever I look up, there’s Mr. Firth, looking slightly to my left. I will take what I can get! Ha.

You know, sometimes you just gotta have some harmless office fun to really get you in the mood for Christmas.

My last blog post was 8 days ago. Life happened, a whole lot of life. Work life, social life, family life and travel life all rolled into one. I honestly cannot even recall what has happened in the past few weeks. All I know is that it has been both hectic and fun. I will take it. On the upside, stress levels are at all-time low. I am juggling work-life quite beautifully right now. Let’s chalk it up to lessons learned at my last job. Before I started my new full-time job, I made that personal vow that family life, mental well-being and social obligations are far more important. To quote one of the most used cliches: life is too short to be miserable. I don’t mind hectic days, I just cannot make a habit of it or forego other of life’s pleasures just because of my 9-5.

I aim to get back into regular blogging this week. I have plenty of photos and reflection to make. I haven’t even given my thoughts on our first Thanksgiving in Australia! Gasp! Unacceptable!

They call it the silly season for a reason. You get silly busy you don’t know what day it is! A more detailed update is in order, that’s for sure. But for now, I will leave you a photo I took last Wednesday evening at our local mall. It was somewhat deserted because it was close to 9pm and we were running around the two grocery stores trying to look for corn syrup and pie shells. We failed at finding both because it was either they were completely sold out (of the pie shells) or they only had glucose syrup (as close to corn syrup they could get). In the end, we eventually found both. Phew!